Investing in Services for Outcomes

The Government wants to enhance the way we work with the social services sector to achieve better results for vulnerable children, young people and families.

The Investing in Services for Outcomes approach will involve simpler and consistent contracting and align the Ministry of Social Development’s $550 million investment in social services with achieving Government’s results for families and communities.

It will also ensure Government priorities drive funding decisions, that funding is shifted to services that make a proven difference and that results are demonstrable. The approach will be implemented over the next 18 months and is expected to be fully operational by December 2013.

Funding decisions will be driven by the Government’s priorities for families and communities: Under this approach, Government will detail its vision for the social services funded by MSD including what it wants to fund, the groups those services should be targeted at and where they will be located. Communities will continue to have opportunities to identify the results they want achieved for their children and young people.

A capability framework is being developed which community social services can use to strengthen their organisation, their responsiveness to their community and alignment with Government priorities: A Capability Investment Resource will be established from July 2012, with $31.65 million reallocated from the existing Quality Services Innovation Fund over the next four years. This will:

improve the quality of social services funded by Government

provide incentives to achieve real results for clients and families

assist providers to join up in communities to achieve better outcomes for their clients, families and their communities.

Community social services funded by the Ministry of Social Development will have results-based contracts which focus on achieving real and lasting results: All providers will have more explicit result measures in their contracts. These will be agreed between the Ministry and providers and will be closely monitored. This will ensure better monitoring of outcomes for individual clients and at a population level so that communities can see what progress is being made. Ineffective services and those that are not performing well will no longer be funded.

The Ministry of Social Development’s funding and contracting services will move to a more streamlinedapproach: The Ministry of Social Development will streamline its relationship management approach that will include simplifying contracting processes for providers and use a variety of funding methods to ensure contracts are fit-for-purpose. This will support community-based providers to deliver better quality services and be accountable for results. It aims to strengthen the delivery of the social services funded by the Ministry, increase collaboration and reduce duplication

Recognising the ongoing impact of the Canterbury earthquakes, the Government is investing an additional $13 million over the next two years in social services for the region. This is in addition to the $20 million already provided to non-government organisations since the September 2010 quake.